Seven (holi)Days
by izfan26
Summary: Samara Morgan falls down the well. where does she end up? Halloween town, of course! JackxSally pre-ring 2002, during "Oogie's Revenge"
1. Chapter 1: unicorns and visions

_**CHAPTER 1: UNICORNS AND VISIONS**_

_**3**__**rd**__** person**_

It was pointless, holding on like this.

Frightened, cold, wet Samara Morgan treed water in the bottom of the well. Her fingernails were gone. Her mother had left her with no company but the garbage bag that was over her head on the way down. She had screamed for help as loudly as she could, scraping her throat raw in the process. Now, it was apparent there was no help coming. She would die. This well was going to be her grave.

But then…

A light… there, at the top. A man's voice was talking to someone.

"…Sally, watch this-" much louder, down the well, "HELLO!" the echo bounced off the walls, making it sound like there were many more of him than there were.

A woman's voice giggling.

Here! Now was her chance! She had to get their attention! She was here! She didn't want to die! She had to call up. C'mon, Samara, you can do it!

The man called down again. "I LOVE UNICORNS!"

More giggling.

What happened next, Samara couldn't quite explain. She took in so much air into her chest, she managed to push out the words with enough force to break glass.

"_HELP! OH, PLEASE, DON'T GO! I'M HERE! SOMEBODY, PLEASE HELP ME!_"

* * *

Jack and Sally looked at each other in astonishment. A child? Down the old, closed well? There hadn't been any missing children in Halloween town lately. Had there? Had she wandered into town and started playing in this old, open field? But then how did the lid close again.

Jack leaned back over the opening. "Who's down there?" he called loudly.

"Samara," replied the scratchy, shaking voice. "Samara Morgan."

The Pumpkin King handed his girlfriend his cell phone. "Call 9-1-1, will ya Sal?" she rushed a few feet away, dialed, and started talking into the phone.

"It's going to be ok, sweetie. Help's coming, hold on just a little longer, we're gonna get you out of there, OK?"

Samara started crying. "I don't wanna die!" she blubbered. "I don't wanna die! Not here! I'm only eight!"

"You're not gonna die!" called Sally. She turned to Jack. "They're on their way, they'll be here in fifteen minutes, but we'll have to keep her talking."

"OK. Uhh…" back to Samara, "Penny for your thoughts!"

"I'm gonna die down here!"

"Worst penny I ever spent."

Sally slapped him. "'penny for your thoughts'?! Seriously?!"

"OW-_you_ say something, then!"

The rag doll woman leaned over the well. "Hello, Samara."

"Mommy?!" the little girl choked hopefully.

"No, dear," She admitted. "But we'll find her for-"

"NO! PLEASE, NO! NOT HER! I'D NEVER BE HERE IF IT WASN'T FOR HER!" a terrified gasp, enhanced by echoes, followed by the sound of her hands clapping over her mouth.

Jack and Sally eyed each other. "Um…" he called down, "what does that mean, darling?"

The sobbing started again. "Oh, no!" whispered Sally. "We can't let her cry, she'll get dehydrated!" thinking quickly, she called down, "My name is Sally, Samara. Sally Finklestein."

"I'm Jack," he piped up. "Jack Skellington."

Samara sniffled. "I never wanna go back."

"We won't make you."

"I don't like it in the barn."

"What?!"

"The horses keep me up at night."

Grinding their teeth, Jack and Sally continued telling her they wouldn't make her go back to her parents, help was coming, just hang on a little longer, dear, etc., etc.,

* * *

It seemed like hours until the ambulance came. When it did, zombie paramedics sent their arms down the deep, dark, dank hole in which the terrified child was trapped. After many hours of reaching with disjointed limbs, it was clear that no combination would reach her. "Grrrauggh…. Phrrreehh… muuuk." They claimed, which translated to, "we're still at least ten feet short!"

Then Jack got an idea. "I'm eleven foot nine."

Sally realized immediately what he was implying. "No, Jack. You're not going to have them grab your ankle and lower you down to get her. It's too dangerous."

"I went down God-Knows-How-many chimneys during the Christmas Incident."

"You weren't relying on rotting flesh and tendons to keep you from falling. Suppose you fall in! They won't be able to reach you!"

Samara let out a frantic wail.

Jack snarled at Sally when she tried to protest again. "Get me down there, Zombies."

Several minutes later, Jack was positioned just over the opening, Zombie Bill's fist holding onto his ankle. "Samara," he called down, "I need you to reach up as far as you can, so I can reach you, OK?"

"OK!"

"Oh, and, ah… you might be a little surprised by my appearance."

"I DON'T CARE! I WANNA GET OUTTA HERE, AND I'M SCARED AND I DON'T WANNA DIEEEEEE!"

"Okay, okay, Samara, honey, I need you to calm down. I'm on my way, reach up for me, OK?"

"…OK, I'm reaching!"

"Here I come!"

Jack dove gracefully through the hole, and started to fall.

Blackness. Nothingness. Falling. But then, Jack saw her tiny hands blossoming up toward him. Mimicking her position, he reached down, in perfect alignment to her hands. But, as he grabbed her, he was trapped in a flash of light.

* * *

_Jack was singing. But, it wasn't his voice singing, it was a small child's. "'Round we go, the world is spinning. When it stops, it's just beginning."_

_He forced himself to look down. This was the body of an eight-year-old- girl. Pale, bare feet and hands (the same ones he gripped like a vice), a white dressing gown, and long, lank black hair._

"_Isn't it beautiful here, Samara?" asked a kind female voice behind him. "So peaceful." He didn't have to turn around to know who this was. A tall woman with tanned skin and black hair up in a braided bun. He felt her rough, callused hand stroke his thick, raven locks. "I know things will get better."_

_Then, a black, thin layer of plastic covered his head. He heard her choking back sobs. "All I ever wanted was you." She whispered. Then, he felt himself fall. The same plummet he just took not moments ago._

* * *

Before the body could hit the water, Jack was pulled back to reality. The child he just had been was gripping his hands tightly, looking at him fearfully, with tears leaking out of warm, brown eyes.

"You're a skeleton." She told him.

"Yeah." He agreed. "Hence the name."

"Jack?!" Sally's voice called from above. "Jack, are you there?!"

He swallowed hard. "I'm here. I got her. Get us up, boys."

In moments, the plummet had been reversed. He climbed out of the hole, and noticed he was holding the tiny child toward the sun, warming her, returning her to the world. She coughed, sputtered, and began to shriek.

"It's OK," Sally assured her as she was loaded onto the gurney. "Samara, you're OK now."

As they drove away, Samara fell into shock, muttering, "it won't stop. It won't stop."

"I wouldn't worry about it, Samara." Jack assured her. "I'll make it stop."

_**END OF CHAPTER ONE!**_


	2. Chapter 2: the one she can tell

"Jack! What's going on?!"

"Who's she? Who's she?"

"Where'd you find her?"

"Jack! Jack! Jack!"

Then, the hospital door closed, _THANK. GOODNESS._

Samara still tried to cling to Jack and Sally as she was wheeled away, but she lost her grip, and decided to imitate a corpse in a casket, arms by her side, looking straight up at the ceiling.

"She'll be fine." Said the nurse. "Now, what's her name? Is she your daughter?"

_**/MEANWHILE/**_

The doctor rolled over to her in a motorized wheel chair. His mouth looked kind of like a duck bill, and his head, completely bald, looked like the balls her father used to play billiards with. The head was bolted shut, and the skin was grey and clammy-looking. He wore a white lab coat, and his eyes were covered by smoked black goggles. His hand was covered in a black glove as he reached for hers. "Samara, I need to ask you a few questions. If you feel uncomfortable answering anything, just tell me and we'll move on. All right?"

She swallowed. "OK."

"Where did you come from?

Morgan Ranch."

"I mean, where IS Morgan Ranch?"

"On an island a little away from Seattle."

The doctor sighed. _I should've known better than to ask an eight-year-old child this._ "Well, why don't I ask you something else, then? Ahhmm… can you tell me about mommy and daddy? A little bit?"

She was silent. "They don't love me."

"I know."

"And I can't tell you anymore."

"What?! Why?!"

"I can't trust you. There's only one person who knows enough for me to tell him."

"Ok, who?"

* * *

"She won't tell me anything."

"Then MAKE her!"

"We're trying to gain her trust here, Jack. In what way do you think forcing her to tell us, total strangers to her, by the way, will do that?"

Jack sighed, face-palming. "Why me?" he demanded. "Why does she want to tell me?"

The door was pushed open. "Why don't you ask her?"

Defeated, Jack walked into the room. Samara lay on a sheet of dark, black hair. The only hint of darkness, other than her deep, dark eyes, on her or the bed. Her pale skin blended into the white cotton of her dress, which was almost invisible on the pure white sheets over the bed. Her fingers were wrapped in sterile white cloth, due to their current lack of nails. "You were the only person who knows," she told him, "thus the only one I can trust."

"Uhh… yeeeeaaaahhh…" Jack replied, sitting next to her on the edge of her bed. "Can you tell me about your parents?"

"Yes." Her tiny hand reached for his, and gripped it tightly.

And a flood of memories hit him full-force. The feeling of water inclosing her infant body, her father attempting to teach her to ride a pony (it committed suicide), and her time in the hospital, living in her attic in the barn, and it ended with Anna Morgan grabbing her coat and saying, "Come on, dear! We're going to have a picnic at Shelter Mountain."

She looked up at him pitifully. "I didn't make her sick."

"No," Jack agreed, "you didn't." it happened, sometimes, with telekinetic powers. Anyone in the vicinity was prone to the sickness, especially with children who didn't know how to control them. If Anna had been Samara's birth mother, she would've had immunity. Elaine had tried to send Samara to a safe place where she could learn to control them. Halloween town.

Samara yawned largely, and Jack suddenly realized how tired she'd looked. Well, with the nightmares that her gifts would generate, it was no wonder she never slept. "It's safe to sleep." He told her kindly. "The nightmares won't bother you here."

"Really?"

"Really-really." As he stood up to leave, he heard her weak voice call after him, "Hey, where am I anyway?"

He smiled at her. "home." He answered. "And I'm not gonna let anyone take you away. Get some rest."

She took that as a valid answer, and in seconds she was snoring.


	3. Chapter 3: a midnight meeting

The house was big. Impossibly big. A black fence and a brick wall surrounded it. On either side of Samara, Jack and Sally (they had given her permission to call them "mommy" and "daddy" if she so pleased) gripped her pale hands. Jack gave her left hand an encouraging squeeze, and they entered the gate. "Do you like dogs, my dear?" he asked, digging out his key.

Samara nodded. "I always wanted a puppy," she recalled, "but it never worked out."

"Why?" asked Mommy.

Then Daddy got the door open. A small ghost dog lunged straight for her. Samara threw up her arms, covering her face. However, the dog's ghostly teeth never found her flesh.

Jack wrangled Zero over to a stake in the yard, where he chained him up tight with a five-foot chain. "Jesus, dog, what am I going to do with you?" he snarled.

Zero was still snarling and foaming at Samara, sensing her powers.

"That's why."

The creaking of wood on hinges woke Jack about 11 that night. He sat up in bed, and thought of all the possibilities, nine out of ten of them involving Sammy alone in the dark with a grown man in a hoodie, holding a knife. One of them involved him naked next to her, holding a gun to her head.

There was no point waking Sally. He could handle one guy by himself. It had to be one guy, he was extremely quiet.

Samara's bedroom was plain. She hadn't had the chance to tack up her drawings yet, but her toy horse sat on her unmade bed.

There was one tiny problem.

SHE WASN'T IN IT!

Jack was about to scream for Sally to call 9-1-1, but then he noticed the skylight was open. A gentle breeze wafted in, waving purple curtains like ghosts. The ladder was down, and it looked like little feet and hands had climbed up it.

"…a dirge for her, the doubly dead, in that she died so young…" Samara sighed and closed her book. It was supposed to be good, and so far, she hadn't understood a word of it. The night air was cool and refreshing on her skin, at least what wasn't covered by her night gown.

She was jolted out of her musings by a finger tapping her shoulder. She turned suddenly and noticed Daddy was on the roof with her. "Did I wake you?" she asked dumfounded. He nodded. "I'm sorry. I tried to be quiet."

"It's all right." He settled next to her. "You don't sleep much, do you?"

She shook her head. "Mommy wanted me back in the house. Really, she tried!"

"I know."

They sat in silence for a while. Finally, Samara started roof-hopping. Jack stood up to stop her, but she said, "Its fine, She'll guide me back."

"Who's She?"

"She is." Samara replied, as though that cleared everything up.

Jack decided to leave it, and started for the trapdoor. "Okay then. I'll be going back to bed. Enjoy your walk."

"G'night."

Jack pondered, as he descended the steps to his bedroom, whether or not they SHOULD take Sammy to that Child Psychiatrist.

Or maybe an exorcist.


	4. Chapter 4: pills

Samara felt like a robot with all this stuff on her head. She was in a white room, one wall made of one-way glass, and a wall of steel separated her from Mommy. She sat at a folding table on a folding chair. A set of cards rested in front of her. _Are you still there?_ She asked Sadie. She felt the older girl's response. _Good._

A voice crackled over the speaker. "Samara, can you hear me?" Dr. Finklestein asked. She nodded twice. "Good. Now, Sally is on the other side of that wall. She's going to pick a card, exactly the set you have, and I want you to tell me which one she's holding. Think you can do it?"

Samara nodded again. Sadako knelt by her pint-sized doppelganger and whispered, "I'll be right back." And she became mist over the child's eyes, showing Samara exactly what Sally was doing, and which card was the right one.

She tapped the heart-shaped card. Then the star-shaped one. The square. The triangle. The circle. The bacon-typed shape.

"Good," cooed the doctor. "Now, there is a stack of blocks on the table. I want you to try to move them." Samara tapped into Sadako's energy. With one thought, she pushed over the blocks. "Anything else you can move in that room?"

He shouldn't have asked that.

Sure, she started small. Just the cards, some papers. But as she started to re-stack the blocks, Sadako knocked them over again. _Sadie!_ Samara cried inwardly, _what are you doing?_

_This should be me, _her friend hissed bitterly. In a fit of angry energy, she tipped over the table, and she would've crushed poor Sally if she hadn't been swift enough to get out of the way. I_ should be the one who was saved from that damn well. _I _should be the one calling these people mommy and daddy! I don't _have _to be stealing _this _life from _you_!_

In the plain white room, there was wind with the force of a tornado, ricocheting off the walls, Sadako's voice screaming, Samara's sobs buried underneath them, and the desperate pounding and rattling at the door behind her.

Sally immediately knew she had to escape, but trying the door, she found it locked. The demon throwing stuff around wasn't bad, she could dodge it easily, but what truly frightened her was that the woman looked almost identical to Samara. She kept picturing her Samara, her baby, as the thing in front of her. She could hear her shrieks of, "Sadie, STOP! NO! _SADUKO! CUT IT OUT!"_

"STAND BACK!" Jack roared from the other side of the door. Jumping away, Jack's foot sailed through the door, knocking it off its hinges. The three adults rushed to the other room, and suddenly, there was silence.

No wind.

No screams.

Total silence.

Jack put his face to the door. "Sammy?" he called. "Honey, are you in there?"

The door flew open. Samara stood there, gazing at her family. Her clothes were in shreds and slightly blackened at the edges. Her skin was covered in scratches and bruises. She must've kicked off her shoes by accident, because she was now barefoot. She wore an expression of pure sorrow and embarrassment. "Daddy…?" she whimpered, as though she were seeking comfort from a nightmare.

"Yes, sweetie, I'm here, I'm right here." He placed skeleton hands on the child's shivering shoulders.

"I… I tried… to make her stop… Sadie… she got mad… I… I'm sorry." Tears soaked through the blood and dust on her face (the dust had been from the table breaking in half).

"No, Honey," crooned Sally, stroking Samara's hair. "It wasn't your fault, no one's mad at you, Samara."

It was here Samara broke down into tears. She allowed her knees to collapse beneath her, and she fell face-first into Jack's shoulder, wailing and coughing into his suit jacket.

"Take her home." Said the Doctor. They were the first words he'd spoken since he'd asked Samara to try moving something else. "She's done exceptionally well for her first session. Bring her back tomorrow. Just give her these pills twice a day. Once in the morning, once at night. One missed dosage could cause another episode." He motioned to the carnage around him.

The pumpkin king and queen nodded, agreeing dutifully that they'd make sure she took the pills at the scheduled times, and took their still-sobbing daughter to the car.

Once samara was safely enclosed in her bedroom, writing God-knows-what in the wallpaper, Sally and Jack went into the living room to recuperate.

"What are we going to do?" Sally groaned, dropping onto the couch, head in her hands. "This girl- she looked just like her! Is that what she's going to do to our baby? Will she trap her back in the well? Will she get angry again during school hours and make Sammy an outcast? What will she do?"

"I don't know." Sighed Jack, holding his head in his left hand, shaking it slightly. "I just don't know. I hate it." Out of the blue, Jack spun around, and flipped the coffee table. "I can't protect my child! She's in danger and I don't know what I can do to protect her and I hate it! I hate that I can't do anything for her, Sally! I hate that I don't know what this thing is capable of and I hate that damned well!"

"I know." Said Sally quietly, placing her arms around Jack's shoulders. "I hate all that too. All that and much more. Placing her head into the crook of his neck, she murmured, "Liebe ist das Verständnis, dass Sie nicht ändern können, etwas, und nicht in die Quere kommen lassen." Something a German man had said once, and they both liked it.

"Yeah, I know." Jack had replied. "aber das bedeutet nicht, dass ich es hasse kann nicht."

"I know," replied Sally. She motioned to the wreckage. "Leg sie auf den Tisch zurück, wie es war."

Chuckling, Jack rearranged the table into roughly its original position.


End file.
